Finding Peace in a World of Worry

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Monthly Archives: August 2016

Well folks, it’s that time of year again. That part of the year where I purchase and eat weird potato chip flavors to let you know if they are worth it or not.

So the people at Lay’s have taken this “contest” (I put that in quotes because the “winning” flavors seemingly disappears within weeks of the end of the “contest.” Never to be had again) and turned it on it’s head. This year they created an international experience with 4 new chip flavors: Chinese Szechuan Chicken, Brazilian Picanha, Kettle Cooked Indian Tika Masala and, Wavy Greek Tzatziki. Each bag sold is worth 100 “miles” that you can collect and go online to win various prizes. We’ve been so swamped here lately that all I’ve had the energy to do is eat and review each chip flavor. Which means we probably missed our chance to win an all-expenses paid trip to Guam.

Dang it!!

Today’s review is on Kettle Cooked Indian Tika Masala. Now in full disclosure this was the chip I was MOST excited about. I freakin’ LOVE Indian food, and Tika Masala in particular.

Smell: A fragrant explosion of curry. Tika Masala is a cream based curry.

Appearance: Like intense BBQ chips but instead of bbq flavor, it’s cumin and turmeric with specks of red.

Flavor: BBQ flavor that is more salty. I do taste a bit of the taste they were going for. They have a starchy after taste. A fair bit of heat, and I do definitely taste the cumin and turmeric (smokey flavors).

Honestly the texture is a bit strange. I’m used to real Tika Masala that you can put over rice. The rice helps to cut the heat and adds a bit of sweetness.

There is NO sweetness in these chips.

I’d rather go for the real thing. Plus I can have leftovers of it and eat it the next day. This bag lasted me 10 minutes.

So in summary, unfortunately this chip didn’t live up to it’s name or reputation. We’ll try a new flavor tomorrow.

Bon-Appetit’ Y’all!

FTC Disclosure: This is not a sponsored post. All items purchased by me.

Today our kitten Riley turns 4 months old. And over the weekend we celebrated his adoption with a party.

No, I’m serious.

And we went all out. I’m talkin’ “It’s a boy” banner outside our house, balloons flapping on our porch and blue gum cigars given out as party favors.

Guys, we even had a cake made into the shape of a litter box. **cue gasps of horror and surprise**

This was a risk and confused the guest of honor at one point. Seriously, we almost had an embarrassing, therapy-inducing incident.

At least it would have made a great blog! 😛

Here are a couple peeks into Riley’s adoption shower:

The snack table was infiltrated! Note the cake made to look like kitty litter

One of his favorite gifts

Unwrapping his gifts

Lovin’ the poo out of the packaging!

(Off topic-I’m trying a new way to display photos on my blog. Let me know if you like it this way or should I go back to the old way?)

We all had a BLAST and Riley enjoyed meeting everyone (we had about 10 guests show up). And now days later, our house is alive with sounds of jingles and beeps and boops from all the new toys Riley has!! (Who knew a cat nip toy is supposed to make noise?!!) These toys are definitely appreciated, especially when Riley is running around playing with them at 3am.

So let me break down what just happened in the living room. First, some background…..Riley not only prefers senior cat food, but enjoys stealing his sisters’ dental treats that I give her once a day.

Tonight when he was out of sight (I had no idea where he was) I got out Phoebe’s dental treats and was in the process of putting them in front of her when……

Suddenly out of freakin’ nowhere Riley comes barreling up to Phoebe much like the way Kanye West did to Taylor Swift when he interrupted her VMA acceptance speech.

Riley was all like, “Hey, I’ma let you finish these dental treats but first I wanna say that I think I am entitled to at least one dental treat per day and I’m gonna take one now….. **in between crunching treat** “Fank Yu!” **exits stage left**

Thank you, Fazoli’s cashier for mentioning “raspberry” among the available flavors when I asked you what flavors you had in Italian Ice (I had a coupon for a free one with purchase). It sounded great, so I agreed to “raspberry.”

Now I’m more than sure you didn’t think I was listening when you turned to the person behind you and said, “one blue raspberry italian ice please.”

No where in my order did I specify I wanted my raspberry to be “blue.”

Ever since becoming an adult, I’ve not understood the concept of “blue raspberry.” Even as a kid I thought it strange, but this was way before I started a blog and I had just been given free candy so I chose to let it be.

But the truth is still the same; raspberries are not blue.

Now I was out to dinner with our family so I didn’t feel it was appropriate to correct you and possibly change my order. I guess I was hoping I had misheard you.

Turns out, I didn’t.

On the positive side of things, my blue raspberry Italian ice did have a very pretty sky blue color. Like drinking a liquified Smurf.

So I guess this is all to say, cashier man, that you are doing a great job

You just need to speak louder and enunciate. 😉

Cheers!

And here we have a picture of Riley asleep on a plate. This picture has nothing to do with our topic of the day, but on the advice of our lawyer I’m trying to provide my blog with photos taken by us or those that I’ve gotten permission to share.

Although today is Monday, I decided to post a LAFF piece because sometimes, you need to start a week on a high note…….

So truth be told this will not be a “In Real Time” piece as I’ve actually already gone ahead and taken the quiz at least twice. The first time was several years ago when it began circulating on Facebook. The quiz? The 1930’s Marital Scale.

Yes, this quiz really gives your self esteem a big ‘ole boost by finding out what kind of wife/husband you’d be by 1930’s standards.

Can you sense the sarcasm?? 😉

If you want to take the quiz yourself after you read this, you can find ithere. The quiz is open to both guys and gals. It is 100 questions long, so I’ll just give you some highlights. Now this is a “Check all that apply” type quiz, so I’ll be pulling out the most interesting phrases and giving my opinion.

1. “Doesn’t darn socks properly.” We have WAY too many socks for this to actually be an issue.

2. “An active member of some woman’s organization.” Hmmm….not really, but funny story, my senior year of high school we each received a senior prediction from other members of our class. My prediction was that I’d be the head of the NOW (National Organization for Women) 😀 (I’m not, by the way. In case that was unclear. 😉 )

3. By “dresses for breakfast” does that mean “wears pants” or “dresses up as if I were to meet the queen?” I’ll let you guess which one applies to me. 😛

4. “Eats radishes, onions or garlic before a date or going to bed.” What the crap was going on in the 1930’s that this would be a concern?? :-O Who would even eat this combination of food in one setting?? Wait, I guess this is back in the day when salads were popular. That makes sense.

5. “Bathes or brushes teeth often.” Define “often.”

6. “Gives husband shampoo or manicure.” So at first I read “gives shampoo to husband” as going into town and buying him shampoo. Then I realized this meant that you shampooed his hair for him….. :-O **crickets chirp as I awkwardly move onto the next question**……

7. “Keeps hair neatly combed or shampooed and waved.” My hair is currently up in a mom bun because it is about 1000 degrees outside. I also haven’t shampooed my hair in a couple days. I may also be wearing yoga pants.

I don’t do yoga.

8. “Lets husband sleep late on Sundays and holidays.” I don’t know where to start with this one. If Chad wants to sleep in, he’ll sleep in. And he doesn’t work Sundays or holidays so this doesn’t apply. I’m starting to wonder if adults in the 1930’s were less adultier then adults in 2016 since they seemed so concerned with spouses sleeping in on certain days.

10. “Reacts with pleasure and delight to marital congress.” Is this the same thing I think it is? Because if so, I think we need to go back to calling it this. Although it sounds a bit stuffy and like you’ll each have to bring a list of ways to cure world hunger and then argue your side. Of course after all this arguing and debating, you are exhausted and decide to just go to sleep. 😛

10. “Praises marriage before young people contemplating it.” I do actually do this, but I also make sure to tell them that it’s a bunch of hard work. Sometimes it totally sucks, but at the end of the day it is SO worth the work.

If I’ve presented this correctly, the young person in question will be staring at me with a blank look in their eyes. You’re welcome, kiddos! 😉

11. “Wears red nail polish.” Well, this isn’t often. I’m currently giving my fingernails some fresh air sans polish. I guess the unspoken truth in this statement is that red nail polish on your finger nails turns you into some sort of hussy. Well, this just got awkwardly interesting….. 😛

12. “Squeezes toothpaste from the top.” I have no idea why this is a relevant quality. I guess where I squeeze the paste on the tube is in direct correlation to how tired I am when I brush my teeth, or if I’m able to turn on a light and see what I’m doing. In that instance it’s a miracle I’ve not brushed my teeth with caulk.

So there are the highlights. Oh and my score? A whopping -8. Yes folks, I’m a failure of a wife by 1930’s standards! 😛

In all seriousness, this was a fun quiz to take and it gives you an insight into what mattered back then. Here is my take away for the modern housewife/househusband….As long as your spouse is happy and the kids (should you have any) are healthy and well fed, you are doing a pretty great job. Even if you squeeze the toothpaste from the top. 😉

Cheers! 🙂

This is what I’d probably look like if I lived back in the late 20’s and early 30’s. Image appears courtesy of S-R Images and our personal archives.

Today’s blog that was supposed to be uploaded on Monday will actually go up today-ish as we had a bit of excitement with a stray kitten that got into our car.

And when I say into I mean, literally crawled UP INTO the guts of our car. But after several hours and super determined neighbors the kitty is free and…..back under our porch where it was to begin with and from where I tried to lure it out with cat food earlier in the evening.

Did I mention this was all in the rain?

We also now apparently have opened a first of it’s kind Transient Kitty Cafe/Budget Motel dealy. The only available lodging is on our porch and the food served is the healthy junk-the human equivalent of mung beans, kale and quinoa.

We may never get strays again.

Anyway, let’s get into our topic of the day….Oreos!

I gotta be honest-the taste of this one makes me confused. I really want to like it. But I could NOT decide if it was really good or not. So I decided to make a pros and cons list. Which ever had the most reasons, would be my final conclusion.

This was hard, y’all. I was so confused and wanted to do such a thorough review for you guys that I ended up eating the whole package.

Don’t worry, it’s not as bad as it sounds as this package only had 20 cookies in it.

At first I was like, “holy crap these are pretty great…” Then when I tried them again yesterday (One day later from the first taste) I began to taste things about them that I didn’t like. Con.

Taste: Fruity gelatin with a tinge of a bitter finish when the chocolate comes in. The bitter taste lingers for awhile after eating. Con.

Not a good life choice to eat the filling on it’s own-the taste alone is like Swedish fish and waxy crayon. Sorry twisters. But dunkers should have no problem pairing this with milk. Con con con/Pro!

Pro: Chocolate cookie instead of the golden. One weird fact about me is that I have a weird food allergy to the golden Oreo and the vanilla filled cookie from the Grandma brand. Big *ss Pro!

Con: Has the taste of Swedish Fish which if you’ve ever had them tastes like the smell of those cheap kids fruity lipglosses that you could buy in the 80’s, fruity artificial sweetness with a mix of cough syrup flavor. Bon’appetit!

Con: Filling is definitely artificial coloring and looks like red play dough–like it’s an exact dupe I’m pretty sure. You could also say that the after taste has a bit of playdough-y flavor for some ungodly reason…..however this could be entirely a psychological reaction to how red the filling is.

Con: the bitter after taste lingers and I’m beginning to wonder why I thought the filling flavor was strawberry when it’s very obviously cherry. Cough syrupy cherry flavor.

So let’s add up the pros and cons……Pros: 2 Cons: 10.

Oh boy! That was kind of a landslide. I feel like now I need to re evaluate every cookie decision I’ve ever made in life. From now on I will not make any snap judgements after the first bite. My full feelings will always be revealed several days after eating the cookie and contemplating life.

Bon-Appetite, Y’all!

Here is what the package looks like and what my face did when I thought about eating them. I should have gone with my gut. 😀

Adopting Riley has been pretty great. There have been some not so fun moments along the way and we are definitely not getting the same amount of sleep as before, but we wouldn’t have it any other way. I guess.

That could be sleep deprivation talking.

Because we have a new member of our family, I thought it’d be neat to start a new series on my blog about Riley’s adventures and lessons he’s learned about the world. This series will be titled, “Dear Riley.”

Dear Riley, I really appreciate your zeal in wanting to help me with housework.

That said, it is a million times harder to scoop the litter boxes when you insist on standing IN them while they are being scooped! 😀

**Excerpt from Kittens Of The Midwest: “Yeah, I spent some time on the streets, trying to find myself. Of course in that time I learned some bad habits, as you can see here. But now I am adopted and it’s cool. It’s cool. Although I still insist on standing in the litter box while it’s being cleaned out. My parents think it’s annoying, but what they don’t know is it’s a tribute to my brothers still kickin’ it on the street. We tight.”

**Blogger’s note: The excerpt and book, Kittens of the Midwest, doesn’t actually exist, but you are right, it really should. Someone should get on that. 😀

**PS (This should be obvious but here goes anyway) At no time in this photo was Riley actually blazin’ up a doobie. We just happened to have a skilled photographer on hand to capture the moment at the right time) 😛

*Photo courtesy of SR-images and our personal archives….that are very quickly filling up with shots of this guy 🙂

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About Me

A housewife and full time cat wrangler of 2 (of the domesticated kind, wild cats would increase my anxiety--although that could create good content for the blog--) who tries to find humor in any and all situations while living life with anxiety
For more fun content including original stories, follow me on Steemit.com at https://steemit.com/@lulabelle